[address-policy-wg] 2006-04 Draft Document will be produced (Contact e-mail Address Requirements)

> > This policy is directed at ISPs and at their customers.
> 
> What makes you think this?

Who else has IP addresses?

> Would it be acceptable to you if it said:
> 
> |All persons and organisations assigned an IP address should
> act to prevent abusive messages originating from that IP address
> without their knowledge"  or smt similarly toothless??

No, because I don't believe it is appropriate for RIPE 
to require 3rd parties to supply any information at all,
not email address, not company name, nothing at all. If
the organization using the addresses has no legal contract
with RIPE, then RIPE cannot oblige them to submit data for
publication.

I do think that it is a good idea for RIPE to require all
LIRs to have an active, responsive email address that is
published. And I think it is good for RIPE to allow 3rd
parties to publish contact info if they operate an
active and responsive email address. But if the 3rd party
does not have a NOC or an abuse desk, then I would rather
see no contact info published so that the LIR is the
first point of contact. Since the LIR does have a contractual
relationship with the 3rd party, they will know how to
get their attention. 

Basically, I think this policy and much of the thinking
behind the whois directory which RIPE publishes, is obsolete
and has been obsolete for almost 10 years. Such things
can only work in a collegial environment such as a university
or a research consortium, but they have proven themselves
to be totally unworkable on the public Internet.

By publishing incorrect information, RIPE encourages people
with abuse issues to waste valuable time trying to contact
the wrong people. The fix to this problem is to remove all
incorrect information from the whois directory that is
published.

--Michael Dillon